Medium Duty Ladders? Advantage?

I am curious after looking over the City of Baltimore's new tiller at the plant and on singerfire.com. I see that they used a medium duty ladder, 250lb tip load, and no waterway or heavy stream device.

I have no idea how they operate in Baltimore, so I certainly will give no opinion good or bad as to this choice, just curious from someone who may be in the "know" as to any possible advantage of selecting the medium duty ladder over the heavy duty. Also seems "different" having no waterway on the aerial, however I am sure this is reflective of how the apparatus is used.

I see that they reduced the tiller length, maybe this was part of the selection? I guess price also has to be factored in thier, just wouldn't figure that would factor into the City of Baltimore's budget. Just seems that even if this piece is used as a "rescue" aerial only, you would want the 500lb tip load of a heavy duty. Look forward to someone shedding some light, I am sure their is a logical explanation that I am overlooking, guess that is what the forums are for.

I serve on this medium duty tiller. These type have only one jack per side, this adds speed in placing the aerial in service. The stick goes to the roof very quickly. A shorter overall length helps corner the piece into the very tight streets here and in Baltimore. I suppose they are a little cheaper. Most of our fires are in row houses and walkup apartments. Very rare to need the ladder on those buildings for other than getting to the roof or rescue. When it is used an elevated master stream it works fine with a 600 gpm. tip on the fly and a bed pipe that delivers the same gallonage. It is not a crane but there are few if any people displeased with the Seagrave brand we buy here.

Medium Duty Ladders

Quite a few departments utilize this type of ladder including: Detroit, Chicago, FDNY to name a few.

If you have more than one type of aerial device in your fleet then these make for a decent ladder when you need to get guys to the roof or when making rescues.

If I'm correct in saying so. I believe the reason why Chicago uses the medium duty ladder is overall height restrictions. Adding a permanent waterway increases the height of the ladder and overall strength.

Dang it guys, I really would like to tell you the advantage of a “medium duty” ladder like the tiller the post is about; over an HD ladder, but I just don’t see any.

The jack spread is narrow but it is a tiller with less than half the tip load of an HD aerial.

The ladder structure itself is a bit lighter than a “HD”, but the GVW rating is still 67,800 on the truck – not a light weight.

It may be deemed as quicker to set up than a HD aerial, but I have to tell you I truly believe that to be a wives tale with today’s ladders. NFPA dictates operating speed requirements by rated height, not HD or MD status.

The height on the truck isn’t given but a waterway under the sections wouldn’t have made much of a difference – just guessing from the picture, the tiller driver’s cab would still be the tallest point. Maybe someone there can tell us the actual overall travel height?

I just can’t think of any real advantage to a MD aerial these days compared to a HD, unless a few more pounds of GVW and a few more $$ is going to kill you, I really can’t.

I think a MD is a “thing of the past”.

This is not to say it doesn’t work fine for the dept. – they probably wanted a true truck and they got it. They also have other HD aerials in the fleet it appears, but I would have just gotten the HD.

Maybe the streets in some of our urban areas are more of the a thing of the past than the MD tiller. It's all we can do at times to get in service with cars parked on both sides of the street in most of our residential areas.

Maybe the streets in some of our urban areas are more of the a thing of the past than the MD tiller. It's all we can do at times to get in service with cars parked on both sides of the street in most of our residential areas.

I don't disagree R1S, but that can be solved by the "tiller" design, or a shoter RM ladder. The fact you metion above alone wouldn't call for a medium duty over a HD, would it? TL

Our rearmount experiment failed many times in the 80's and early 90's. Trucks not able to make the turn and parked hundreds of feet away at the intersection caused us to go to almost all tractor drawn except for one Aerialscope and one 135 RM. We had some havy duty tillers, LTI, Hahn- Firespire, that were very manueverable so you are correct, it is probably not a medium duty issue. We also send the second due ladder to the rear on every box. These alleys are lots worse than front access.

MD Ladder

My understanding is that in older cities with lots of row houses they don't have a lot of set backs and most ladder work is at higher angles where a 250# tip load works fine. A big issue is a MD aerial can be put on a single rear axle with the foot print almost as small as a pumper. Can be fairly manuverable in tight streets and not need the more expensive tiller unit. Unfortunately budgets are everything in the larger older cities.

My understanding is that in older cities with lots of row houses they don't have a lot of set backs and most ladder work is at higher angles where a 250# tip load works fine. A big issue is a MD aerial can be put on a single rear axle with the foot print almost as small as a pumper. Can be fairly manuverable in tight streets and not need the more expensive tiller unit. Unfortunately budgets are everything in the larger older cities.

I'm not sure that anyone is offering a 100 footer on a single axle anymore regardless of rating (HD or MD). SOrry, I guess you could get a Metz! HD!!